Friday, July 08, 2016

Did I ever tell you how much I cried when my old Singer sewing machine died? (The answer is a lot.) It was a mechanical machine bought new by my mom in the 1970's. The thing was practically a tank though it couldn't stand up to the jostling of a cross-town house move. I still miss that old mechanical machine even though my new machine, a Janome DC2013, is light years more advanced.

I'm reminiscing on the old machine today because a new mechanical Singer has come into my life - a 1909 Singer 27.* Its arrival into my house was total serendipity; I was talking about old sewing machines with coworker A when coworker M mentioned she had been looking for a good home for her Mom's old Singer for a good while and would I be interested in it? Yes. Yes, I would.

The machine itself is lovely and comes with a sewing cabinet. The cabinet houses the treddle mechanism, has drawers for storage, and protects the machine when not in use (configuration shown below).

I also really love the Sphinx decals! You can see the bobbin winder in this photo, as well.

The machine is in pretty good shape, though it could not actually drive the needle when I first got it. After a good oiling and adjusting the drive band, things are running much more smoothly. (I will note that having done maintenance on my 1970's Singer made it a breeze to oil this one; it's easy to "read" where mechanical machines need oil once you're used to them.)

I still have some fiddling to do on the machine. The thread tension needs adjusting and it needs new screws for the needle arm faceplate (this parts search is looking to be a bit of a rabbit hole).

Otherwise, I'm really excited to get treddling and enjoy this beauty!

* I've been amazed at how much information there is out there about old Singers. They don't come with model numbers on them, but that's not a problem because someone made a database of model type by serial number. Need a manual? Here's one! Now if only I could find those screws...